chickens and bird flu...is it worth it?

[Tensing]

It doesn't need to be expensive making Chicken houses, even with just basic skills a great house can be made.

[red]

I wouldn't let the threat of potential avain flu put me off keeping chickens. It was a media frenzy on slow news days last winter, but it all came to nothing.

it came to nothing because the migration stopped. Migration will happen again, and bird flu will spread. Its taken years to get as far as Europe, but it still came.
If it mutates into some sort of human plague - then we have all had it, and so I don't spend too much time worrying over that which I cannot control. However the people that *have* caught bird flu are people who have close contact with chickens. so if you are thinking of keeping chickens, it *is* something to consider.

Then comes the question of whether its safer to keep your own if you can or eat mass produced eggs etc and the opinions go on. The danger is sposed to be from not from the birds, but from breathing in dried bird poos. and if you keep chickens, (and I have before) there is always plently of bird poo.

Having said this, I shall probably opt to keep hens myself, yes, in a covered run. I don't like the arks.. they seem so pokey.. and only really work if you let the hens out all that time, and thats not covered then. besides which we have plenty of foxes round here. but hey.. thats my opinon.